Karaba Brick Quarry

Karaba Brick Quarry

After driving five hours from Ouagadougou, the capital of the small West African country of Burkina Faso, one arrives at the small village of Karaba.
A short distance from the dusty main road, a cavernous pit appears beside a field of corn. The color is dazzling and the regular tectonic forms suggest a vast subterranean architectural project. This is the Karaba quarry where men carve bricks from solid stone using only short-handled iron picks. In the hot equatorial sun they excavate the material that will become the basic building blocks for the homes and walls that structure the surrounding communities. I have been documenting the quarry since 2008 on my annual visits to Burkina Faso.